Furnace radiator mounting



United States Patent FURNACE RADIATOR MOUNTING James H. McQueen,Indianapolis, Ind., assignor to Hall- Neal Furnace Company,Indianapoiis, had, a corporation of Indiana Application May 20, 1953,Serial No. 356,260 4 Claims. or. 126-118 This invention relates to aheat radiating structure to be manufactured separately from and appliedto a heating furnace such as the warm air type of furnace. A primaryobject of the invention is to provide a structure which may be preformedand handled in a linear form and sent to the job for installation abouta cylindrical combustion chamber such that there Will be intimatecontact with the radiating structure by the combustion chamber wall.

Heretofore there have been many forms of fin radiating structuresdevised to be applied and mounted around the outside of the combustionchamber wall, but one of the great problems has been to get such anintimate contact between the radiating structure and the combustion wallchamber as to permit an actual intimate contact between the radiatingstructure and that wall for high conduction or heat from the Wall intothe radiating structure.

Costs of course must be kept at the lowest possible level, and thereforethe radiators to be applied to heating furnaces have to be made at arelatively low cost so as to insure their usage over and above the useof a combustion chamber wall depending entirely upon its cylindricalsurface alone for heat conduction.

The present invention embodies the concept of forming a fin typeradiator in a linear manner wherein fins are applied to a planar sheetof metal, and then when the assembly is taken to the furnace, it may bereadily curved around the cylindrical wall of the combustion chamber anddrawn up snugly thereagainst so that all of the fins in the structurewill be in intimate contact along certain Zones thereof, this contactbeing effected by means for applying tension to the wall carrying thefins so as to drive these fins against the wall and hold themcompressively thereagainst.

In addition to the above indicated objects and advantages of theinvention, many additional ones will become apparent to those versed inthe art in the following description of one particular form of theinvention as illustrated in the accompanying drawing, in which:

Fig. 1 is a view in top plan of a structure embodying the invention;

Fig. 2 is a view in side elevation and partial section;

Fig. 3 is a view in top plan of a fin radiator structure before applyingto the furnace;

Fig. 4 is a detail in vertical section on the line 4-4 in Fig. 1; and

Fig. 5 is a detail on an enlarged scale in vertical section on the line5--5 in Fig. 2.

The invention is herein illustrated and described as being applied to aconventional type furnace employing a cylindrical combustion chamber andhaving a radiating drum 11 through which the products of combustion arecirculated and eventually taken out through the stack pipe 12.

A radiator structure is initially formed by fixing a pin rality of fins13 to a sheet of metal 14. The metal 14 is initially in planar form, sothat the fins 13 may be attached thereto and extend throughout itsvertical height.

End portions of the metal plate 14 are turned therefrom substantially atright angles thereto to form the end fins 15 and 16 respectively, Fig.3, and each of these fins 15 and 16 have their outer ends bent over toform the respective flanges 17 and 18 which are in substantialparallelism to the plate 14.

Each of the fins 13 is formed to have a foot 19 which is employed as themeans for securing therethrough the fin 13 to the plate 14, such as byspot welding. The fin 13 in each instance is also provided with a foot20, herein shown as turned from the opposite side of the fin 13 in eachinstance in respect to the foot 19, this being for a matter ofconvenience in giving ready access to the foot 19 in the spot weldingprocedure. As indicated, these fins 13 are spaced at regular intervalsalong the plate 14 between the end fins 15 and 16.

The fins 13 in each case adjacent to the end fins 15 and 16 areinterconnected with those end fins at their upper end portions by a rodor bolt 21 and 22 respectively.

On the side of the metal sheet of plate 14 reverse from that to whichthe fins 13 are attached, and at the lower corners thereof in respect tothe location of the rods 21 and 22, there is fixed to each cornerportion respectively a flexible metal strap 23 and 24, these straps 23and 24 being readily bendable. Straps 23 and 24 may be attached to theplate 14 by any suitable means, such as by spot welding.

The assembly of the radiator structure thus far de. scribed is made tohave a length such that when it is applied to the combustion chamberwall 10, and carried therearound, it will cover substantially the sidewall between the ends of the radiator drum 11. The combustion chamberwall 10 is provided with a pair of radiator support brackets 25 and 26adjacent the ends of the drum 11, and so located as to receive the boltsor rods 21 and 22 thereover when the structure is bent around thecombustion chamber wall 10, this condition being achieved by bending thewall 14 with the feet 20 of the fins 13 resting against the member 10.In the form herein shown, the vertical height of the plate 14 issubstantially equal to the vertical height of the drum 11.

In order to bring the feet 20 of the fins 13 as well as the feet 17 and18 of the end plate fins 15 and 16 into intimate contact with the wallIt), the straps 23 and 24 are carried between the wall 10 and thebrackets 27 and 28 which are fixed on the drum 11. These straps 23 and24 are respectively pulled between those brackets and the wall 10 as faras they may be carried and then are bent around over the brackets andinto the folded conditions where the end parts 38 and 29 overlap thestraps between the brackets 27 and 28 and the plate or sheet 14, thesharp angular bend of these straps about the brackets 27 and 28 beingsufficient to prevent their slipping and allowing the plate 14 toretract from that position which causes the feet 20 to be compressivelyengaged against the wall 10 as is best indicated in Fig. 1. 7

By this method of pulling the sheet 14 around as tightly as possible toinsure contact of the feet 20 against the Wall 10, that contact ismaintained throughout the life of the furnace particularly in view ofthe fact that during heating operations when the radiating structure isactually effective, the wall 10 will be quite hot, and will of course beexpanded from its original condition when the radiator was originallyapplied in the erection of the furnace, and therefore that compressiveengagement of the feet 20 of the fins 13 will be tended to be increasedrather than decreased, so that in actual operation an extremelyeffective radiating effect is obtained.

It is to be noted of course that by the formation of the radiatorcomposed of the plate 14 and the fins 13 extending vertically throughoutits length, there are providcd a plurality of flucs 30 between adjacentfins 13 as well as the end fins and 16. This flue" action of coursetends to accelerate flow of air across the surface of the combustionwall 10, as well as across the surfaces of the radiating fins 13, alltending to heat the air as quickly and as efficiently as may be possibleunderthe conditions of such a structure.

The brackets and 26 carry the vertical load of the radiator through thebolts or rods 21 and 22, and the straps 23 and 24 insure the physical,intimate compressive contact of the fins 13 through their feet 20 withthe wall 10.

Therefore, it is to be seen that I have provided an extremely simple andyet most effective heat radiating structure for application to heatradiating surfaces, and while I have described the invention in the oneparticular form, it is obvious that structural variations may beemployed without departing from the spirit of the invention, and Itherefore do not desire to be limited to that precise form beyond thelimitations which may be imposed by the following claims.

I claim:

1. In a furnace, the combination with a furnace curved heating radiatorwall, of a metal sheet carried circumferentially around a part of saidwall; a plurality of spaced apart fins between said wall and said sheetextending approximately radially from abutment with the wall intoabutment with and secured to said sheet; means vertically suspending thesheet and fin assembly by its upper end portion along said wall; andmeans urging the lower portion of said assembly toward said wall tomaintain said fins in intimate contact with said wall, said last meanscomprising a length of a flexible member secured by one end to a lowerend portion of said assembly extending therefrom by a length; and abracket carried in fixed manner by said furnace adjacent to and beyondsaid assembly end portion, around which bracket said member length isreversely bent under tension as both a radial and circumferentialretaining means.

2. The structure of claim 1 in which there is a second flexible membersecured to the assembly at its other lower end portion, and a secondbracket carried by the furnace spaced circumferentially from said secondend; said sec ond flexible member reversely bent under tension aroundthe second bracket as a radial and circumferential holding means,whereby said assembly is tended to be stretched between said twoflexible lengths and maintained under tension against said walltherebetween.

3. The structure of claim 1 in which said bracket has a post and inwhich said flexible member is a metal strap and is bent around the postof the bracket by a sharp reverse U bend to retain the strap undertension between the bracket and said assembly.

4. In a furnace, the combination with an arcuate length of a furnacewall; a fin radiator assembly comprising a plurality of spaced apartfins and an outside enclosing plate, said fins being disposed normallyof said plate with one edge portion of each fin secured to said plate,said last named fin edge portions being substantially parallel to eachother; a pair of straps relatively narrow in respect to the height ofsaid plate and fixed by one end eachto end portions of said assembly;said assembly being wrapped around said wall with ends of said finsabutting the wall and the fins spacing the plate from the wall; a pairof brackets carried by the furnace one circumferentially spaced apartfrom the other around said wall length and adjacent each of saidassembly ends; and said straps being pulled in opposite directions onefrom the other and bent sharply over each of said brackets inapproximate U shape maintaining the intervening assembly compressiblyagainst said wall.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS1,680,907 Nevel Aug. 14, 1928 1,716,083 Neal June 4, 1929 1,942,211Hartwig Jan. 2, 1934 2,161,477 Holmes June 6, 1939 2,191,349 LengyelFeb. 20, 1940 FOREIGN PATENTS 707,514 France Apr. 14, 1931 645,280Germany May 25, 1937

